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Doctor Who is an effects showcase for the BBC; boasting creatures old and new, stunning landscapes of distant planets and gadgets which have catapulted young imaginations everywhere.

The highly anticipated eleventh series will see the biggest shake-up since the show was rebooted in 2005, with Jodie Whittaker replacing Peter Capaldi as the first female doctor, and Broadchurch’s Chris Chibnall taking over as showrunner following Steven Moffatt’s departure.

A transition not quite so publicised is the changing of hands with the special effects team, with Milk VFX now handing the baton over to DNEG (Blade Runner: 2049) for the next series after working on the show since it began.

Jodie Whittaker in Doctor Who (Picture: BBC)

Through Milk’s involvement across the reign of David Tennant, Matt Smith and Peter Capaldi, the process behind creating the show’s special effects hasn’t changed all that much.

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Speaking to Metro.co.uk, CG supervisor at MILK VFX Dominic Alderson, said: ‘The technology changes a little bit and that pushes us to try more creative things – because technology is better and the software is getting better, they push our creative ideas more.

‘Doctor Who is its own very specific world so whatever you create, you need to make sure you’re living in that world. I think it’s been pretty similar since I started on it.

There are lots of challenges,’ Dom added. ‘Every new episode of Doctor Who has got some crazy sci-fi idea or creature so it’s a lovely challenge to try and conceive these things and see what you can come up with.’

Doctor Who has created some iconic creatures over the years, whether classic monsters like the Daleks or Cybermen, to modern horrors like the Weeping Angels.

When it comes to picking favourites however, it doesn’t take long for Dom or visual effects producer Louise Hastings to hone down personal bests.

Speaking to Metro.co.uk, Louise said: ‘I think episode four Knock Knock was my favourite, because I loved how creepy it looked in the end with the lice crawling over the guy and dissolving him into dust.’

‘The half-faced man was an exciting one to work on,’ Dom added. ‘The prosthetic team did a great job, and the make-up team as well. We built a prosthetic head with all the little cogs and mechanisms moving inside so we used that as a reference.

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‘On set the make-up team had painted half of his face off, we then go in, remove all of that and do it again in digital visual effects.

The half-faced man in Doctor Who (Picture: BBC)

‘That was a really challenging one because we had to make sure we could track his head, every little movement of his head, and to make sure all our 3D objects, all the cogs, sat in the right place and didn’t wobble and move about so it looked like it was all seamless.’

A part of their struggle working on Doctor Who was logistical, with some episodes only being finished a week before they were scheduled to air.

With each episode they have ‘five or six weeks’ to work on the special effects after it’s all been shot, with a visual effects supervisor guiding filmmakers on-set over framing and feeding back effects they’ll need to support the shot.

When asked about the key to creating timeless special effects, the answer is, unsurprisingly, not so simple.

Peter Capaldi had his last bow as the Doctor in last year’s Christmas special (Picture: BBC)

‘It’s difficult to answer that,’ Dom says. ‘I think about timeless special effects in stuff that I like, it comes down to is it serving the story? Has it got a reason to be there?

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‘I think if you keep throwing special effects at people they get bored which is a crazy thing to say, because once upon a time it was really expensive to put a couple of hundred shots into a film, now we’re putting thousands of shots into a film and people are expecting it.

I think the trick is to do something that serves the plot, the story and on the flip side of that, it can be the invisible effect, you might be expanding something like creating a period of time that doesn’t exist anymore. So I think that’s timeless as well, if you do it right.’

Doctor Who’s eleventh series is expected to start later this year.

The VFX Festival took place at Rich Mix Shoreditch and was created by Escape Studios, part of Pearson College London.